Sorrowful Heavens
by Moonlight Listener
Summary: Everyone has had their share of sorrow...but there are some that just have to deal with more than others...and no matter what, there'll be someone there to listen and help.
1. Chapter 1

She ran.

She ran as if her life depended on it—and it did. She was being chased by a pack of wolves which were hot on her heels. She already lost her knife and right now, she couldn't stop to use her keys.

Her feet pounded into the dirt as she dodged trees and low hanging creepers. She saw a patch of light in the distance through the foliage and mist, when suddenly something caught her ankle, sending her flying to the ground. A stray vine had been pulled taut between two trees. She looked back towards the direction she just came from. The wolves would soon be upon her. She raised her arms to shield her face when suddenly…

…There was a whimper. Several in fact. Slowly and cautiously, she lowered her arms and saw through the darkness of the mist, arrows were embedded in the wolves eyes, a dark liquid falling from the corner of the eyes. There was a shuffle near her, and she looked up. There was a person towering over her, a cape flowing from its head down. In their hands was a simple bow with a notched arrow pointing dangerously at her hand.

The bow was lowered and two jade eyes looked at her.

"…Runaway Daughter of Jude Heartfilia, Celestial Mage Lucy."

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**Yes...I know...I haven't updated in a while, BLAME SCHOOL! And yes...I am creating a new chapter story, and there's going to be MORE pressure on me to update, I KNOW! Please just be patient, I beg of you but right now academics come first in my opinion, I will try to update either Two Year's Time of The Five Angels of Fiore first...but right now...please tell me if you want me to continue this story, I KNOW THIS IS SHORT but, by the end of this week, there will either be another chapter posted or this story will be deleted. Review, and happy readings!**

**~Moonlight Listener **


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter Two**

The Girl untangled the vine that snared Lucy's leg.

"Stop." The Girl hands stilled as she looked at the disheveled blond girl who placed her own hands above hers. "I know what you want."

The Girl blinked. "What?"

"You know, the reward, the reward for turning me in back to my father."

The Girl blinked her jade eyes. "…no." She continued to unravel the wet vine. Soon the vine was untangled and Lucy scrambled to her feet, raising one golden key.

Slowly she said, "What do you mean…'no'?"

The Girl released the arrow from it's notched position and placed it into a quiver at her hip and placed the bow around her shoulders. "I mean…no, I'm not going to turn you in, I think there's a more noble way to earn the money me and my sister needs." She raised a hand. "My name's Aurora, come with me, you'll be safe with me and my sister…I promise."

Slowly, and carefully, Lucy raised her hand, to slide it into Aurora's grip and shook their hands up. And down. Twice.

* * *

They exited the forest carrying two wolves each. Aurora said that they would be put to good use with their fur…and possibly their meat. Lucy was dubious about holding a dead carcass but Aurora said that she needed to put aside her high-manners and start living the free life. So Lucy did just that—though slowly at first—and picked up one dead wolf before Aurora piled one on top of the one Lucy already held. Now, they were in the middle of what seemed to be the country side of Fiore. They were walking down a dirt path in the middle of a green field that seemed to have gone forever into the horizon.

Aurora had brown wavy hair, and in the light, you could see auburn streaks. Her jade eyes seemed to be the center of attention of her light tan face. On a belt, Lucy failed to notice before, an unlit lantern with matches sticking out of a pouch next to the lantern.

Aurora was bubbling all along the way, and Lucy was happy to answer her questions and comments, ranging from "What kind of dresses did you wear?" and "I really like your magic." Lucy's arms were starting to go numb from the weight of the wolves, when suddenly Aurora called out, "LIFE!"

"Wha?" Aurora shifted the wolves in her arms to the nook of her left arm and pointed in front of her, where in the distance, there was a small cottage at the edge of a tree line, with a girl bending over a long sword, which shined brightly black. "LIFE!" The girl looked up, and with a confused look, she gave a very pretty smile.

Aurora sped to the girl and dropped the wolves at her feet. She waved frantically at Lucy to hurry up and when Lucy finally came up to the two girls Aurora introduced them. "Life, this is Lucy, Lucy, this is my older sis, Life!" Lucy gently placed the wolves at Life's feet and gave a smile towards Life.

"Hello, it's nice to meet you, your name is very interesting." The girl looked at her cautiously, before extending her hand, which Lucy took.

"Life Abailard, aren't you…"

"Lucy Celestine Heartfilia," Aurora answered.

Life's eyes widened, "What are you doing here? Aurora, I thought you were going to hand her in." Aurora's eyes also widened.

"What? Why would I do that?" Aurora hugged Lucy around the waist, affectionately, surprising both Lucy and Life. "She's my friend!"

Life snapped, "What have I told you about making friends?"

"You're always saying that," cried Aurora. "Can't I just have one friend in my lifetime huh? What're you going to say to that Lily?"

"Aurora, you are going to go back and hand her over to the officials and collect the money. Otherwise, I'm going to take your lantern."

"_No, _you can't do that!" Aurora unlatched herself from Lucy's waist and grabbed Life's hands and was on her knees. "Please don't make me do this!"

"Aurora, _now_." Aurora dropped her head before suddenly standing up and dashing off, past the tree line. Life didn't even flinch, she just turned to Lucy and said, "You should go back to your father, you aren't welcome here." With that, Life turned her back on Lucy and went inside her cottage, shutting the door behind her.

Lucy was taken aback by Life's behavior. Lucy sighed and turned in the direction of where Aurora had run off. She left a trail among the soggy dirt and broken twigs in her wake. Lucy carefully made her way past the tree line and into the forest. After a few minutes, Life peeked out through a curtained window. _We can't afford to be connected to any more people Aurora…not after her._

Dappled sunlight lit Lucy's skin as she made her way through a forest, following the dirt footsteps Aurora left. She finally was met with a large oak tree, its width equaling 30 average willows, and its height towering over the canopy line. Lucy looked up, and through the leaves she saw a small cloaked body lounging on a branch. Raindrops…no…tears fell from 50 feet up. "Aurora!" The girl looked down; brown locks of hair framed her face. Her small hands held the lantern tightly.

"Hey Lucy, I thought you left."

Lucy shook her head, "Nah, your sister doesn't scare me."

Aurora giggled, "Really? One time, I tamed a wolf and brought it back home, but Life scared it so much that I never saw him again." Aurora started climbing down the tree, hooking her lantern all the while to her hip again. She grabbed her hand and started dragging Lucy deeper in the forest, "I want to show you a place that only Life and I know."

By the time that they arrived at the unknown place Aurora was leading Lucy to, it was nighttime. Aurora had her lantern lit and in her hand. Finally, there was a large cluster of trees, planted so close together, it was hard to squeeze through, but when they did, they found themselves in a raining section of the forest.

"Whoa…" No sunlight was able to penetrate the soggy grass underneath their feet. The thick leaves dripped with rain drops. "What is this place Aurora?"

Aurora placed a hand over the lantern to keep it from going out. "Life doesn't come into the forest at all. One day, I was following a fox out here, when I saw the thick trees close together. I squeezed through and found it raining inside. During the few times Life and I went into civilization, I went to the library to research this area. Apparently, they're called Weeping Willows. Mages from all around the world experience sadness, and when their grief comes to extreme measures, they can form Weeping Willows, right where they're standing.

Aurora suddenly smiled and placed the lantern on a very small dry patch of grass, and pulled Lucy out. "C'mon, let's dance!" Lucy smiled. As she twirled around getting her golden locks wet, instead of Aurora she saw someone else.

_"__What're you doing Mama?" _

_"__Singing Lucy, c'mon it's fun!" Two golden haired Heartfilia's were twirling in a large puddle, one hand over the other, clutching the other person and leaning back giggling, with dark blond hair flapping about their face in thick locks of hair. _

_They looked like two angels that got caught in the storm. _

_One day, one of those angels passed away along with the storm. _

"Why…why do you come here Aurora?"

"I come here often to relive memories of when I was younger. I used to play in the rain…dancing…laughing…laughing with my sister…Life never approved of me in the rain, even though she went out…though she did nothing in the rain, just standing there."

_Her name was Rosaline Abailard, and she was the life of the Abailard family. She had reddish-brown hair bouncing about her tan face. "C'mon Li-nee, Rora-nee! It's fun!"_

"Wait, Aurora…if you didn't play with Life, just who _did_ you play with?"

Aurora glanced down at her lantern. "Rosaline…my dead younger sister." Aurora fingered markings at the base of the lantern. Sloppily, there was a rose scratched on the wood. Through the rain Lucy saw that she was near tears. "She…died a few years ago. That was when Life became…" Aurora's eyes grew wide.

"Became what Aurora?"

It was not Lucy who answered that…it was Life herself, standing between the trunks of the trees with cloak tied around her shoulders and an angry expression on her face.

* * *

**I apologize if there are any grammar mistakes or false errors. Review to alarm me if there are such mistakes and for constructive criticism. **

**Happy Readings!  
~Moonlight Listener **


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter Three**

"I thought I told you to go away." The three girls were now situated at a round table inside the cottage. Life had dragged them both out of the rain and back to the house dripping wet and all. Drops of water splattered on to the wooden floor of the cottage as Aurora's lantern stood high on a tall shelf where Aurora couldn't reach it. The only light that lit up the room was the fading sunlight and candles fixed around the room. "Just to let you know, I've informed the guards." Lucy perked up.

"W-what?"

"You heard me, the Knights will be here soon to take you away back to Jude Heartfilia, they promised me an award of fifty hun-"

"_Why would you do that Life?_" Aurora was standing on both feet, her rage causing several drops of water to fly around the table and put out one single candle in the middle of the surface. Life was unfazed by her reaction.

"Obviously to survive, that money could help up Aurora, we wouldn't have to go back into the forest to look for dead wolves for warmth and pigs for food. We can finally—"

"But have you considered what Lucy's going to go through? For running away?"

"That's her problem; she shouldn't have left in the first place."

"There's obviously a reason why she left Life!"

"And there's a reason why I contacted the Knights, they'll be arriving in a week's time, due to our…isolation." Aurora once again had tears in her eyes, before starting to emanate muffled choking sounds, while Life just looked away. "She'll be staying with you Aurora in your room because you brought her here." Life started making her way to the exit of the room, towards her own quarters. She stopped at a threshold, "You can have your lantern back Aurora." And finally, she left. Aurora scrambled towards the shelf, dragging a chair along and standing up on it, to retrieve the precious article.

"I'm sorry for my sister's behavior," Aurora stated quietly. "She's always like that, ever since Rosaline." Aurora shuffled back to sit down on a wooden chair angled away from the table. Lucy was silent, before turning her body towards the girl. In the light, her skin glowed orange and her dark brown hair seemed to shine. A thin papery towel was draped across her shoulders, hiding her wet shirt.

"Lily…why do you call her that? Isn't her name Life?"

Aurora nodded. "Of course it is. But…" Aurora sighed. "Before Life…became…you know…she used to be very~…feminine. By that I mean that she would dress up in red and pink and she would go and find pieces of thread around the house to weave them into large ribbons. She didn't really like her name then. I was about five at the time, and I decided to call her 'Lily'. It was kind of like her real name, and she agreed. It's been her nickname ever since."

Aurora turned her moist eyes to Lucy's dry ones. "…Luce…can I call you that?" Lucy stiffened.

"L-Luce?"

Aurora beamed, "Yeah! Luce! It can be your new nickname."

_Nicknames…_

_ "__One of the great things about your name Lucy my child, is that you can twist your names into many secondary names—they're called nicknames dear—such as…Lu-chan, that's a nice name right?" _

Lucy nodded brightly, "Of course." A silence fell upon them, a beautiful silence that was filled with candlelight and soft smiles, before it turned dark.

"Rosaline…she died at the hand of my Mother's." Lucy's head snapped towards the girl. Rosaline didn't seem bothered. "Not murder…starvation…even though if you think about it, it _can_ be murder. My father died a few weeks after she was born. He was a Rune Knight you see, he died when he went on a mission to capture a legendary Celestial Goddess, but he never made it to his destination. Mother never really…cared. She wasted the money left, and ended up broke. She found money elsewhere…maybe a distant relative that pitied us…but she always failed to care for us…and one day, it resulted in the loss of Rosaline."

Aurora was silent for a moment, before continuing. "Then, a few nights later, she comes home with arms full of food, a feast. Life and I barely ate though, eating the same amount of rations we ate on regular nights. We thought it wouldn't have been fair if we stuffed ourselves without Rosaline. But that night…when the owls opened their eyes and gave a hoot, when the air was chilly and you could barely see without the fortunate moonlight…our mother left…forever. She took all of the riches with her, whatever that was left at least. Except for two things."

"What were they?"  
Aurora had a longing gaze, pointed towards the floor before she snapped from her daze and gave a small smile. "I'm sorry; it's just that, this is probably the first and only time that I get to open up to someone. Anyway…you'll have to ask Life what they were. I don't want her to be any madder at me then she already is."

Over the next few days, Lucy tried warming up to Life, but she always turned her back to the golden haired mage. But one night, she finally caught the older girl at an appropriate time.

It was late, around 11 in the evening, and the three girls had just finished tending to the garden under the light of Aurora's lantern. Aurora had already went ahead to her bed, and all was quiet within the house. At the fireplace, Life lit a fire and sank herself into a wooden chair that wouldn't done nothing to ease her discomfort. "What. Do. You. Want?" Life gritted out, as she finally became aware of the Celestial Mage standing a few feet behind her, staring at the back of her head.

"…I want to talk to you." Life harrumphed and didn't dare to look at Lucy. "It's about something Aurora said a few days ago."

A silence ensued after she said that, not one saying anything until Life snapped. "Well? What is it?"

"It's about what happened…with your mother."

Life said nothing; she only stared at the crackling fire in the fireplace.

"…I just want to know…why…you're …you know."

"No…I don't know."

"Unemotional." Life didn't respond—Lucy expected that—and only once again stared at the fire. Lucy sat down near Life. "Aurora said that—"

"She said _what_?" Life finally turned her head to Lucy, with the fire in the hearth in her eyes. "What did she say? That I turned into a heartless sister? That I turned into a cold stranger? What? What did she say? That I was a horrible made up mother? That I wasn't nice enough to play hopscotch anymore?"

She broke.

"Mother left us! She killed Rosaline in her own unmotherly way and then she decides to make up for it all in one night! And then she leaves? She takes everything away. Aurora's the only family that I had, and I was afraid to lose her, so I changed! I changed to make things work, I couldn't leave Aurora to fend for herself so I changed! Mother was stupid enough to leave two things behind: a stupid armband and necklace. Every night I think of turning back into the way I used to be: girly and fun, when I would feel the coldness of the metal press into my skin reminding of my mother's failure."

Life slid down to the floor carefully. For the first time, Lucy saw emotion.  
"She left me, she left me…" Lucy lunged and pulled Life into a hug, cradling the girl.

"My father basically did the same thing to me. I ran away to escape the riches that were the reminder of who I was supposed to be, who my father was." Life said nothing, she only cried.

"Lucy? Life? What's going on?"  
Lucy looked up and found Aurora standing at the threshold rubbing her eyes.

"Is everything all right?"

Lucy gave a wry smile. "Yes Aurora, I'm sure everything is fine now."


End file.
